VOL. 12, NO. 2
North Carolina Wesleyan College, Rocky Mount, N.C.
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 4,1996
Cox named Academic Dean
By TEQUILA MOORE
Dr. Mary Ruth Cox was re
cently named the new Vice Presi
dent and Academic Dean of North
Carohna Wesleyan College.
She was also given a tenured
appointment as professor of En
glish.
Cox comes to the school from
Hobart and William Smith Col
lege where she held the position
of Assistant Provost.
Cox received her undergradu-
Dunn Center
to host state
dance group
The North Carolina Dance
Theatre, North Carolina’s only
professional ballet company, will
perform this Friday at 8 p.m. in
the Dunn Center for the Perform
ing Arts.
Tickets are $14 for the re
served section, $12 general ad
mission, and $ 10 for students and
senior citizens.
The Dance Theatre’s program
will include four contemporary
dance pieces: Salvatore Aiello’s
“Piano Concerto #1,” danced to
music by Keith Emerson of
Emerson, Lake & Palmer; John
Clifford’s “Fantasies,” to music
by Ralph Vaughn Williams; “Es
cargot,” choreographed by Louis
Falco, known for his work on the
movie “Fame;” and “Rubies,” a
dance for two choreographed by
George Balanchine, danced to the
music of Igor Stravinksy.
The company has historically
stood at the forefront of the na
tional dance scene. In addition to
successful New York appearances
and two European tours. North
Carolina Dance Theatre has per
formed at major dance festivals,
including the Spoleto Festival in
Charleston, S.C.; the American
Dance Festival; and the Aspen
Dance Festival.
Currently the company is un
der the leadership of Artistic Di
rector Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux and
Associate Artistic Directors
(Continued on Back Page)
ate degree at Indiana Wesleyan
College. She went on to receive
her Ph.D. in English at Oklahoma
State University. She held sev
eral positions at Bartlesville
Wesleyan College. These posi
tions were English, humanities,
and writing professor, and she
became the Chairwoman of Hu
manities.
In 1991, she was the Assistant
Dean at University of Minnesota,
Morris. She later relocated in
1993, where she held her admin
istrative position at Hobart and
William College.
In her speech during Opening
Convocations on Sept. 9, Cox
noted that the year the Class of
2000 earns their degree “will be
the year that all of humankind
will cross a significant boundary
of time that holds both great
promise and great uncertainty.”
Noting that Wesleyan is a lib
eral arts college, Cox said that
liberal arts “is a type of education
that helps ensure that the citizens
LEAVING — Jane Wampler, working at her desk in the Wellness
Center, is due to leave in November. (Photo by Karolyn Braun.)
Wampler to leave
state next month
By MONICA ALSTON
Wesleyan’s Wellness Center
staff members have exf>erienced
considerable turnover with the
absence of Dr. Evans Harrell, the
psychologist who left during May
this year, and now the announce
ment that the nurse’s secretary
and good friend, Mrs. Roberta J.
Wampler, is leaving Wesleyan in
November to move out of state.
Mrs. Wampler is better known
throughout Wesleyan campus as
Jane, her middle name. It has been
four years since she came from
Harrisburg, Pa., in August of 1992
to join her many friends of fac
ulty, staff, and students she’s cre
ated thus far.
When asked of the influence
that Wampler has had on the cen
ter, Student Life counselor Betty
Ann Whisnant described her as a
“wonderfully talented coworker
with the ability to make students
feel at ease.”
Describing her work experi-
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of a free society know enough,
and understand enough, and ques
tion enough, and learn to be re
sponsible enough, to remain free.”
Cox told students that the fac
ulty, staff, and program of the
college “are dedicated to the task
of helping each (student) develop
as a free citizen in the world,
ready to assume leadership and
responsibility wherever you
choose to live and work in the
next centuiy and the next millen
nium.”
DEAN MARY RUTH COX
Gibbons shares
from unfinished
work at reading
By JESSICA BROWN
Author Kaye Gibbons read
from an unfinished, never-before
heard manuscript before a crowd
of about 200 people in the Pow
ers Recital Hall on Sept. 24.
She filled the hour-long read
ing with humor which the audi
ence enjoyed.
An award-winning writer. Gib
bons has written five novels, Ellen
Foster, Sights Unseen, A Cure
For Dream, A Virtuous Woman,
and Charms of An Easy Life.
“What I write is realism. I
write in my imagination to create
reality,” said Gibbons. She told
the audience that she enjoys re
searching for her books, and that
she researched the unfinished
novel for a year. Three out of five
of her works are set in history.
Gibbons’ novels all concentrate
on language, which she feels is
the heart of any work.
The manuscript she read was
about Emma Garnett, a woman
who grows up in the early 1800’s
in Chesapeake, Va. While read
ing, Gibbons would stop to ex
plain how she came up with char
acter names, mostly all of which
came from real people around the
Rocky Mount area.
“Emma Garnett is my
gynecologist’s wife’s name, and
I like her so much that I named
the main character after her,” she
said. She also joked early in the
evening that “If I sign a book for
you tonight and you have an in
teresting name I’ll give you 50
cents for it.”
In the story, Emma will even
tually marry and move to Tar-
boro to begin a plantation with
her husband, said Gibbons, al
though she has not yet written
that far.
“I’ve put Rocky Mount in
many of my previous books, and
now I am going to move to Tar-
boro. I know nothing about it,
and I am going to make it up,”
Gibbons joked with the audience.
Hallmark is currently working
on production of a television spe
cial of Ellen Foster. Gibbons said
she had no part in it, and that it is
due out in early spring of next
year.
After completing her current
work. Gibbons plans to write a
novel based on the Great Influ
enza FniHf^mio n*" ' O n ' O ] g